The Tragedy of the Common Forest

NOTE: This column, which ran in the Oregon Daily Emerald, won the
1996 Eric W. Allen award for editorial writing.

The Pacific Northwest forest conflict will not be solved by the timber industry
or the environmental movement, nor will it be solved by management
agencies such as the Forest Service or the Fish and Wildlife Service. The
solution will not be proposed by Congress, and it will not be concluded in a
court of law. The resolution will not come from the general public. It's
entirely possible that there is no solution.

Experts concluded 30 years ago that a nuclear arms race had "no technical
solution." [1] Because both sides faced increasing military power and
decreasing national security, there could be no winner. Similarly, all "sides"
in the forests conflict face increasing demands on decreasing resources, and
no one group is likely to give up its dwindling share to benefit the others.
The "tragedy of the commons" is a concept first outlined in 1833 (and later
described by Garrett Hardin [2]) which holds that users of a public resource
will demand an increasing share of the common good to the detriment and
eventual loss of the resource.

The timber industry is motivated not by greed, as the environmentalists
declare, but by profit. Faced with a dwindling supply of public timber, the
industry is not likely to cut production by forgoing any supply it's able to
"win" in court. It's even more unlikely that the environmental groups will
cede any of what they see as their share. One of the scientists who helped
draft Clinton's Forest Plan was astounded when leading environmentalists
criticized it. "If I could have whispered to Andy Kerr three years ago what
would be in this plan," he said, "Andy would have thought he'd died and gone
to heaven." A management plan that makes environmentalists that happy
won't ever be designed, because their motivation includes not only profit but
a zealous commitment to their cause of preserving the forests for future
generations.

What, you say? Environmentalists motivated by profit? Well, of course they
are -- groups from Earth First! to the Audubon Society require funding for
publications, staff, attorneys and legal costs, travel and office expenses just
like any other group. Beyond that, environmental groups will not cease their
protest or lawsuits because they are a conflict industry -- if there were no
conflict, they'd have no reason to exist. Conflict and crises generate
membership, funding, and continued existence.

The forest issue is a "no technical solution problem" partly because neither
group will voluntarily cede any of its share to the other side. Beyond that,
consideration of the management functions of the Forest Service and
Congress reveals that no solution can be forthcoming from either source.
The Forest Service receives its budget from Congress, and members of
Congress decide how it will be spent. The agency's historic focus on timber is
best explained by Forest Service Chief Jack Ward Thomas:

"When Congress funds my wildlife budget at half of what I ask
for, and research at one quarter what I ask for, but the timber
sale program at two-and-a-half times what I ask for, what do
you THINK is going to happen?"

Members of Congress are motivated by their financial resources -- after all, if
you can't afford a successful re-election campaign, you're no longer in
Washington. Major contributors to those who fund the Forest Service are the
resource-dependent members of the timber industry.

Forest management plans, no matter how carefully crafted by the Forest
Service, are repeatedly sabotaged by both the timber industry and the
environmental groups, who manipulate the administrative and judicial
systems for their own gain. Each "victory" is really a loss, not only for the
other side, but for every shareholder and -- ultimately -- the forests.

And what of the American public? Both sides claim to speak for all the
citizens who "own" the national forests, and the American public is
increasingly concerned about forest issues. But the public's motivation
toward a solution is stalled by the complexity of the issues. The public has no
effective means of input into the industry--Congress--agency system, and
public understanding is limited by the media's simplification and
misrepresentation of the issues.

The solution -- if there is one -- will not come of conscience, responsibility,
compromise, or management plan. The solution can come of only mutual
coercion born of leadership, and that leadership, should it appear on the
horizon, must come from outside the current loop. The motivations of the
affected groups dictate that no solution will be proposed by one side nor
accepted by the other.

Philosopher A. N. Whitehead wrote that the "essence of dramatic tragedy
is not unhappiness. It resides in the solemnity of the remorseless working of
things." [3] The tragedy of the forests in the Pacific Northwest, similarly, lies
not in the loss of jobs, economic base, owls, family tradition, community
cohesion, salmon, or even biological diversity; the tragedy is the remorseless
working of things and the lack of a leader who might avert a tragic destiny.